By Eric Delanyo Alifo | Project Leader/Attorney
HelpLaw Ghana provides free legal services to the poor and less privileged Ghanaians, particularly, indigent accused persons who are mostly jailed because they are too poor to hire lawyers to defend them. It is a continuing process and the charity is doing several cases in all the superior courts of Ghana including the Circuit Courts, High Courts, and the Court of Appeal. Bail has been acquired for several indigent accused persons and trials are ongoing for many in of the courts. Since December 2012, when HelpLaw was accepted on GlobalGiving, the charity has obtained bail for more than 11 indigent accused persons charged with various crimes and held in custody without trial between 1 and 3 years.
HelpLaw has also filed a landmark writ in the Supreme Court of Ghana, challenging certain police practices as unconstitutional and seeking to reform the criminal justice system of Ghana. The writ has been filed through the Founder of the charity and shall be heard on February 27th, 2013. The full writ is provided here: http://www.help-law.org/Supreme_Court_Writ.pdf. Whatever the outcome of this writ may be, it shall be of great benefit for the poor and indigent accused persons who rarely have legal representation in the courts in Ghana. With the funds raised through GlobalGiving now available, HelpLaw has engaged one attorney to join the Founder to argue the case before the highest court of Ghana.
HelpLaw has also been improving its publicity to reach out to more people who may need the services of the charity. The Founder has been speaking on radio stations, and one beneficiary has also spoken on a popular FM radio interview in the capital of Ghana, Accra. The interview is here: http://www.help-law.org/LEGAL_AID_BENEFACTOR_REPORT.mp3
Since its inception, the Founder of the organization has been operating from home. However, with the availability of the funds raised through GlobalGiving, the charity is in the process of acquiring an office close to the courts in order to improve its accessibility to the target group and provide them better services. In a local Ghanaian dialect, "ayekoo" means thank you and depicts gratitude from the one expressing it. In this vein, the project leaders of HelpLaw Ghana wish to say to the GlobalGiving team and our present and future donors as well as our numerous admirers ayekoooooooooooooo.
Links:
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
